Assisted Suicide (Venture Bros. episode)

"Assisted Suicide" is the 53rd episode of the American animated television series The Venture Bros.

Plot

The episode begins with several characters (including Brock, Sgt. Hatred, Shore Leave, Hank, Dean, and Dr.Orpheus) playing touch football. The game is interrupted when Brock senses someone is in his car. It turns out to be Dr. Venture in an apparent attempt to kill himself (albeit a poor one as he tried to asphyxiate himself in a fully electric car). In quick succession he tries to kill himself with a road flare, shaving creme, and Brock's combat knife.

After being taken into the compound and examined by Dr. Orpheus it is determines that Dr. Venture is not truly suicidal but in fact possessed.It is revealed that the Monarch has entered Dr. Venture's mind via a non-Guild regulation device. The Monarch's disembodied psyche has set up shop in the "Master Control Room" of Venture's brain, and is driving his suicidal urges.

With the help of the greatest treasure Dr. Venture values (but notably not his children) Dr. Orpheus enters into Dr. Venture's mind, where he meets the personification of the two greatest forces in the human psyche; Eros (who manifests as Billy Quizboy) and Thanatos (who manifests as Pete White). Together they cross the levels of Dr. Venture's mind, passing by the Id, Ego, and Super Ego. Meanwhile the Monarch's tamperings inside Dr. Venture opens the floodgates of Venture's horrific past, revealing more of his traumatic childhood.

Meanwhile Henchman #21 and Dr. Mrs the Monarch bond while watching over The Monarch's physical body (unable to forcibly remove him from Dr. Venture's mind at the risk of "turning him into a vegetable". When the murderous moppets show up for a routine safety inspection, Dr. Mrs the Monarch and Henchman #21 cover the Monarch's condition from the moppets, to avoid Guild repercussion. They go so far as to fake a threesome, and later share a drunken kiss.

Finally the Monarch, after Dr. Orpheus confronts him with the horrible memories of all Hank and Dean's deceased clones, flees from Dr. Venture's mind.

Awakened and released from the control of the Monarch, Rusty goes out side to see mild chaos as Hatred and Brock argue over how to deal with Dean (who had sat on an anthill and was now nearly stripped and being hosed down). Dr. Venture declares that his children are "his problem" and not the responsibility of the two feuding bodyguards.

The episode concludes with a brief conversation between Dr. Venture and Hank where he relates a story of how he was humiliated yet again at the hands of both his father and the original Team Venture... and he implies it was this (among numerous other incidents) responsible for turning him into the person he is today and nothing, not even his own nightmares, can bother him anymore.

Cultural References

During the football game Shore Leave refers to Dr. Orpheus as Professor Snape.
As Orpheus begins Dr. Venture's exorcism, various characters are shown to be prepared for extreme projectile vomiting, in a nod to the infamous scene from The Exorcist.
Rusty's mind being shown as a white corridor with multiple doors is a parody of The Matrix Reloaded and Hospital World in Silent Hill 4: The Room.
When 21 asks Dr. Mrs. the Monarch if she thinks the Monarch will "bring back a pissed off Billy Mahoney", he's referencing the movie Flatliners.
21 and Dr Mrs the Monarch discuss their love of the original Star Trek, particularly the episode "The Corbomite Maneuver".
21 recites part of Roy Batty's final speech from the movie "Blade Runner."
Dr. Mrs. The Monarch & 21's bonding and drinking over the Monarch's comatose body is reminiscent of scenes from Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind.
Ego is seen trying to fix a puppet of Rusty Venture, a reference to Geppetto from Pinocchio.

Connections to Previous Episodes

The women seen in Rusty's id include Molotov Cocktease, Myra Brandish, Sally Impossible, Dr. Mrs. the Monarch, Dr. Tara Quymn, an idealized version of the nurse stripper from Nightingales, and Lindsay Wagner. It is unknown whether these women represent various types of women that Rusty has been attracted to or if they are women that he has been intimate with in some format. This display, however, creates a continuity issue with Everybody Comes to Hank's (which was written after this episode), as Nikki Fictel is absent. Possibly it was deliberate for reasons yet unexplained. This episode was written as the second episode of the half-season but was pushed back to the sixth.
Sgt Hatred tells Brock about the time Hank shot him in "Blood of the Father, Heart of Steel" .
Hatred makes references to his "OSI days", effectively confirming that he is one and the same as the 'Sgt. Haine' who appears in The Invisible Hand of Fate.
Doctor Orpheus psychically proves that Dr. Venture does not genuinely love his sons. A similar event occurred in the episode Eeney, Meeney, Miney... Magic!

Production Notes

Footnotes

Bibliography

TBD

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